Enhancing Creation Apologetics through Biblical Theology—Part Two

Posted on by April 15, 2025
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My introduction to biblical theology in seminary was through this book by Zuck, Merrill, Bock, et. al.

In the first post of this series, I set out to define biblical theology. As I mentioned there, it can be challenging to provide a succinct definition for biblical theology, in part because it requires plenty of nuance. This is why I contrasted it with systematic theology, so that we can see how it differs from the way that most Christians in the West, and particularly apologists, tend to think about biblical teaching. The contrast between these two approaches to theology will continue to show up in this series.

In that post, we looked at how biblical theology provides a strong argument in favor of interpreting the six days of the creation week in Genesis 1 as normal-length days. In this post and the next, we will look at another passage from Genesis 1–11 to see how biblical theology can help us acquire a better understanding of these chapters.

Genesis 6:3 and Systematic Theology

The proper interpretation of Genesis 6:3 has been disputed for many years. One of the reasons for this has to do with the ways in which it has been translated. This is how it reads in the NKJV.

And the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.”

Two popular interpretations have arisen from this passage. Among creationists, it is often taught that this pronouncement from God was given 120 years before the great Flood. Thus, man was essentially given a 120-year countdown to repent. The alternative view is that God was going to drastically reduce man’s maximum lifespan from nearly 1,000 years to just 120 years. Let’s refer to these as the countdown and lifespan views, respectively

Supporters of these positions often use systematic theology to defend their interpretation of this passage. For example, those favoring the countdown view will point out that for more than a dozen generations after this verse, people were still living well beyond 120 years. Noah lived to 950 years, his son Shem reached 600 years, and Shem’s son Arphaxad made it to 438. Even Abraham, many generations later, lived 175 years. So, how could this passage be about setting a limit of 120 years on man’s lifespan? Also, this verse appears in the same chapter where God announced the judgment of the Flood, so this must be the context in which we interpret the verse. And the Apostle Peter seems to support this position when he stated that God waited patiently to carry out judgment while Noah built the Ark (1 Peter 3:20). Taking these three arguments together, it may seem obvious that this verse should be understood as teaching that God gave mankind 120 years to repent.1 But…

Whenever you only hear one side of the argument, you should keep in mind the following verses from Proverbs 18.

“He who answers a matter before he hears it, it is folly and shame to him.” (Proverbs 18:13)

“The first one to plead his cause seems right, until his neighbor comes and examines him.” (Proverbs 18:17)

A common point in both of these proverbs is that no one should give an answer before he carefully examines the details from both or all sides. In this situation, we haven’t even looked at the arguments for the lifespan view or considered how supporters of this view might respond to the argument raised against it in the previous paragraph. And we haven’t checked to see if there are strong arguments against the countdown view. We will turn our attention to all three of these issues after a quick observation about how the arguments raised so far relate to biblical and systematic theology.

Notice that the arguments for the countdown view came from a systematic approach. The positive arguments (the passage is in the chapter that introduces the Flood and 1 Peter seems to support it) and the negative argument (the lifespan view seems to have a fatal flaw) are not drawn from careful exegesis of Genesis 6:3 or from an analysis of the themes and narrative of the passage. Instead, proponents of the countdown view call upon details found later in the Bible and attempt to apply logic to rule out the alternative view, which would leave their own view standing alone. To be fair, there are times when those who favor the lifespan view will do something similar. As I mentioned in the first post, there is nothing wrong with using a systematic approach, if it is done correctly. But if it is done prior to doing exegesis and biblical theology, then one runs the risk of overlooking some key details, and I believe that is precisely what has happened here.

Delayed Judgment? No Problem

The argument against the lifespan view is not as strong as many people think. Should we automatically reject the view because people were still living well beyond 120 years for many generations after God announced the judgment? In fact, it wasn’t until the time of Moses, more than a thousand years later, that man’s lifespan dropped to 120 years. If there is such a delay in the judgment, how could anyone attribute the reduction in man’s lifespan to the passage in Genesis 6:3? Two responses need to be made to this question.

An entire chapter in my book Fallen: The Sons of God and the Nephilim is devoted to addressing the meaning of Genesis 6:3.

First, while it is true that Moses was the first one mentioned in the line from Noah through Abraham to Moses who did not exceed 120 years—he died when he was 120 years old (Deuteronomy 34:7). However, the generation after Noah saw a significant drop in lifespan. Noah lived 950 years (Genesis 9:29), but his son Shem died at 600 (Genesis 11:10–11). The next three generations reached the 400s, but the following generations only reached the 200s, and by the time of Abraham, lifespans had dropped under 200 years. Using biblical theology, we should look at these details from the perspective of the Israelites in the years following their exodus from Egypt. They would have recognized the immediate decline in lifespans from Noah’s time down until their own time when people no longer outlived 120 years, so it would have been easy for them to connect Genesis 6:3 with a judgment on man’s lifespan. We’ll have more to say on this point later.

Second, the argument about delayed judgment proves too much because the countdown view is also, by definition, a form of delayed judgment. If God were truly telling humanity that they had 120 years to repent, is that not also a delayed judgment? And it if is acceptable to think that God had delayed judgment for 120 years, then why is it not also acceptable to think that he delayed or partially delayed it for several generations? I added “partially delayed” because man’s lifespans started declining immediately following this, so it wouldn’t be fair to say that the entire judgment was deferred for many generations.

There are other instances where God delayed a judgment for many generations. He essentially gave the wicked Amorites at least 400 years to turn from their evil ways (Genessi 15:13–16). He gave His people 490 years to faithfully carry out their covenant with Him concerning their land, but they failed to allow the land to lie fallow every seventh year for nearly 500 years, which is why God kicked them out of their land for 70 years (2 Chronicles 36:21; Jeremiah 25:11). So, there is nothing unusual with God’s judgment taking several generations to be fully realized.

Problems with the Countdown View

There are some significant problems with this view that are often overlooked. One issue that should concern advocates of the countdown view is that most commentators on Genesis do not agree with them. For example, the commentaries by Alter, Brueggemann, Cassuto, Sailhamer, Sarna, Westermann, Wenham, Matthews, and von Rad favor the lifespan view. Many others either gloss over the issue altogether or simply list both views as possibilities. Very few favor the countdown view, and the earliest writer I could find who adopted this view was Augustine in the early fifth century. While this may offer comfort to countdown advocates, I would not place much stock in Augustine’s words given his frequent forays into allegorical interpretation.

The proper interpretation of a passage will not be decided by how many commentators, or which commentators agree or disagree with a particular view, even though their writings can be rather instructive. Ultimately, we need to search the Scriptures like the Bereans commended in Acts 17:11, and it is here where we find some major problems with the countdown view. Let’s take another look at Genesis 6:3.

And the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.”

Before engaging in systematic theology, we need to figure out what the verse actually says rather than assuming an interpretation and searching the rest of the Bible to find arguments for or against a preferred position. When we do this, we will see some major difficulties for the countdown view.

Problem #1 – Who heard the Lord say these words?

Did you notice that this verse never tells us who God spoke these words to? Proponents of the countdown view sometimes assume that he was speaking to Noah, who would have been 480 years old at the time, if this view is correct. But this is an idea read onto the text—it certainly never tells us this. The verse just tells us that God spoke these words. Up until this point in Genesis, whenever God had spoken to people or to the serpent, it always tells us who He was addressing (see Genesis 1:28–30; 2:16–17; 3:9–19; 4:6–15). Whenever His words were not addressed to those on earth (whether it was “inter-trinitarian” dialogue or He was speaking to members of the divine council or heavenly court), it does not tell us who He is speaking to (see Genesis 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 14–15, 20, 24; 2:18; 3:22). Since Genesis 6:3 does not tell us who God addressed, then based on the trends we have seen in the first five chapters of Genesis, we have good reasons to believe that He was not speaking to a man. Instead, it makes much more sense to interpret this as inter-trinitarian dialogue or God speaking to other heavenly beings.

If God did not speak these words to men, then the countdown view loses most of its explanatory power. Part of the appeal of the countdown view is that it sees God as giving mankind a warning, showing that He is longsuffering because He is giving them so much time to turn from their wicked ways. In this way, it would be similar to Jonah preaching to the Ninevites, telling them that Nineveh would be overthrown in 40 days (Jonah 3:4), but in this case, it would have been 120 years. However, if God never spoke these words to man, how would anyone know that they had 120 years to repent? After Jonah delivered his message, we are told that the people of Nineveh repented, which was an appropriate response. However, there are no statements following Genesis 6:3 that tell us how people did or did not respond to this supposed warning. Furthermore, Jesus seemed to indicate that the people of Noah’s time “did not know” (Matthew 24:39) that the Flood was coming to judge them.

Problem #2 – Strive or Abide?

This point will be a bit technical because it has to do with how this verse should be translated. At the heart of this difficulty is the word translated as “strive” in the NKJV (see also KJV and NASB or “contend” in the NIV). In many other Bibles, this term is translated as “abide” (ESV, NRSV), “remain” (NET, HCSB), or something similar. For example, the ESV states, “Then the LORD said, ‘My Spirit shall not abide in man forever…’” There is a big difference between God saying that His spirit would not strive or contend with man forever and stating that His spirit would not remain in or abide in man forever. The NET Bible includes a helpful textual note to explain how two vastly different concepts could be translated from the same term. [Note: the Hebrew letters don’t translate properly in WordPress. The entire note can be viewed here at NetBible.org — see note 5.]

The verb form ?????? (yadon) only occurs here. Some derive it from the verbal root ????? (din, “to judge”) and translate “strive” or “contend with” (so NIV), but in this case one expects the form to be ?????? (yadin). The Old Greek has “remain with,” a rendering which may find support from an Arabic cognate (see C. Westermann, Genesis, 1:375). If one interprets the verb in this way, then it is possible to understand ????? (ruakh) as a reference to the divine life-giving spirit or breath, rather than the Lord’s personal Spirit.2

In the New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis, Richard Schultz explained that this verb is likely derived from dun (instead of din), as supported by the Septuagint, Latin Vulgate, and modern etymological research.3 This would mean that the verb should be translated in a way that conveys that God’s spirit would not continue or last with or in man.

Problem #3 – The Problem Is Not Resolved

For the sake of argument, let’s assume that the Hebrew term should be translated as strive or contend, which is essential for the countdown view. There is still another issue for this position. That is, according to this understanding, God was going to do something that would resolve the problem of His spirit striving or contending with man. That something was the Flood. However, the Flood didn’t truly solve the problem because sinful man is still on the earth, and God’s spirt is still striving or contending with sinful man, just as before the Flood. At best, the Flood just minimized the problem for a little while, but it would not take long for man’s rebellious ways to proliferate.

To Be Continued…

The second half of this article will be posted soon. Now that we have covered some of the problems with the countdown view and the major objection to the lifespan view, we need to make a positive case for the latter. That will be the focus of the next post in this series, and we will also look at some plausible reasons why a reduced lifespan was an appropriate punishment for people at that time.

Thanks for reading!

  1. Creationists have proposed other reasons for the rapid decline in man’s lifespans. One idea is that God may have done something to our genetics to cause this, such as speeding up the rate at which our telomeres shorten. This would presumably place a shorter limit on the amount of time our cells could divide, which would lead to shorter lifespans. Some have pointed to the lifespan of Noah’s father, Lamech, who lived 777 years and died five years before the Flood. Perhaps a mutation in his genetics led to his shorter lifespan compared to his ancestors. However, the Bible does not tell us whether Lamech died of natural causes. Since the world was filled with violence at that time, it is not a stretch to think that he may have been killed by others. Also, Noah still lived 950, so it’s unclear if he had some mutated gene for a shorter lifespan. ↩

  2. Biblical Studies Press. 2005. The NET Bible First Edition; Bible. English. NET Bible.; The NET Bible. Biblical Studies Press. ↩

  3. VanGemeren, Willem, ed. 1997. In New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology & Exegesis, 1:940. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House. ↩

Enhancing Creation Apologetics through Biblical Theology—Part One

Posted on by June 28, 2025
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Thinking carefully about how the original audience would have understood biblical passages can improve our understanding of Scripture and enhance our apologetic efforts.

Readers of this blog know that I am unashamed to be a biblical creationist or what has often been called a young-earth creationist (YEC). We believe Genesis 1–11 should be understood according to the plain sense of the text, which teaches that God made everything over the course of six, normal-length days approximately 6,000 years ago, and that the Flood in Noah’s day covered the entire earth and accounts for the majority of our fossil record.

I have been writing and teaching on this and related subjects for more than 25 years, so I am well-acquainted with most of the arguments for and against these positions. I believe that many of my fellow young-earth creationists have done an admirable job of defending the historical accuracy of Scripture. However, I’m sure we can all agree that there will always be room for improvement. Over the past several years, it has become apparent to me that most YECs and most other apologists tend to overlook biblical theology, a discipline that can greatly enhance our understanding and defense of Scripture, particularly those foundational chapters of Genesis 1–11.

Before addressing how biblical theology can help us improve our apologetic, we need to define what biblical theology is and why it has frequently been overlooked by biblical creationists and other apologists.

What Is Biblical Theology?

Those unfamiliar with biblical theology may think that it simply refers to Christian theology in general, since our theology comes from the Bible. But that isn’t really what we are talking about. Biblical theology is a specific approach to doing theology. The Got Questions website defined it as “the study of the doctrines of the Bible, arranged according to their chronology and historical background.” Although it lacks some necessary nuance, this brief definition is a helpful place for us to start.

A statement from the Ten Commandments provides the necessary context to properly interpret the days of Genesis 1.

Biblical theology investigates how themes and doctrines are developed within the pages of Scripture in a chronological manner. That is, it essentially starts from the time God began to reveal His word and seeks to understand the themes and overall narrative of Scripture and how doctrines are developed over the course of the Bible’s time periods. It attempts to discover how the original audience might have understood a particular passage. For example, concerning the subject of creation, biblical theology does not look at the modern debates over creation/evolution or young earth/old earth and then search the Bible to find the answer. Instead, it considers the time, place, and culture of the original audience and tries to see the passage through the eyes of the original audience. What could they know? When and how could they know the details recorded for us? How would they have understood it?

While I’m sure there are many exceptions, generally speaking, I believe this approach appeals to folks who may still be left-brain dominant but have a little more right-brained tendencies or perhaps they are closely balanced between the two. Biblical theology puts the researcher into the shoes of the original audience to consider how they would’ve thought about various topics when they first encountered them. It is essentially an inductive approach to the Bible as it uses categories and themes that come from within the pages of Scripture. And the questions it answers are those that are specifically raised by the text itself.

Biblical Theology Contrasted with Systematic Theology

Biblical theology is often contrasted with systematic theology. Systematic theology seeks to compile and arrange all data into useful categories. For example, systematic theology scans the pages of Scripture to find everything it has to say about a given theological subject, such as creation. In many cases, systematic theology also incorporates any relevant information that might be found in philosophy, history, and science to develop a view on creation. This approach is attractive to those of us who are left-brain dominant because that is generally how we think. It is deductive in that we start with a completed Bible, develop our categories, and then we use the data of Scripture to fill in those categories.

Scientists, mathematicians, and other left-brained folks emphasize the logical arrangement of data so that it is easier to retrieve whenever it is needed. And looking back on the history of the modern creation movement, the majority of its leaders have been scientists, science educators, engineers, and other left-brained individuals. Thus, our approach to Scripture has generally been via a systematic approach.

The highly respected Old Testament scholar Eugene Merrill stated the following about historical and systematic theology.

Systematic theology is concerned to view and articulate biblical truth in terms of the complete canonical witness without particular concern for the developmental process at work to create its final shape. It is the more synthetic of the disciplines and aims at a unified result. Biblical theology is concerned to discern, trace, and describe the progress of divine revelation throughout the canon from its earliest to its latest expression. It logically precedes systematics and is the bridge between exegesis and systematics.1

While this series focuses on biblical theology, I want to be clear on this point: I love studying systematic theology, and I’ve often considered pursuing a PhD in this discipline. I have a whole shelf full of very thick volumes on the topic, many of which I have enjoyed reading. There is nothing inherently wrong with a systematic approach, but it often overlooks some important details, and if you are not careful, you can easily pull a passage out of context to support your beliefs. This can be entirely unintentional, because you might be unaware of the theme woven through a given book if you have only studied the Bible from a systematic approach. Also, it is not uncommon for researchers to impose an extra-biblical framework on Scripture so that whenever they interpret a given passage, they are interpreting through a lens that is not even biblical. On the other hand, a shortcoming of biblical theology is that it doesn’t always use the safeguards inherent in systematic theology. For example, those doing systematic theology regularly compare Scripture with Scripture to make sure that our conclusions don’t contradict other teachings of the Bible. But since a person doing biblical theology starts at the beginning without assuming truths revealed much later, they may reach conclusions that are contradicted by later revelation. Ideally, we would all possess a solid systematic theology that is grounded in sound exegesis and biblical theology.

There is much more that could be said to properly define these terms, and they overlap at times, but let’s finish this first article in the series by looking at how someone might address the topic of the length of the days in Genesis 1 from these two approaches. Future articles in the series will explore other subjects found in Genesis 1–11.

A Practical Example – Six Days?

YECs have shown time and time again that the six days of the creation week should be understood as six normal-length days. We have made positive cases for this position. For example, we have shown how the term for day (yom) when used in similar contexts refers to a 24-hour day, and we have detailed that whenever biblical writers or figures, including Jesus Christ, allude to the events of the creation week, they consistently treat the days in a straightforward manner. We have also successfully defended this position against Christians who seek to harmonize Genesis 1 with the notion of the earth and universe being billions of years old, as proposed by most modern scientists.

My first book defends biblical creation while demonstrating the many shortcomings of the numerous views that seek to harmonize the Bible with the idea that earth is billions of years old.

I have no doubt that we are right to promote and defend this position, and we should do these things in a respectful, God-honoring manner. This is what I sought to do in my first book, Old-Earth Creationism on Trial, which was written to defend the young-earth creationist understanding of the Genesis creation and Flood accounts. However, nearly every promotion and defense of the YEC position from its proponents would fall under the category of systematic theology. We compile everything the Bible has to say about the events in Genesis 1 and show how the other passages support YEC. Occasionally, we also engage in historical theology when we highlight what Christians throughout church history have taught on the subject, but rarely do we base our arguments on biblical theology.

Let’s quickly explore one example of how biblical theology can strengthen our position. This might be a bit challenging for some readers to think through because we are so accustomed to approaching this topic systematically.

When interpreting the Bible, we first must ask ourselves what the text actually says. Then we need to determine what those words actually mean in context. One aspect that comes into play here is trying to figure out how the original audience would’ve understood the passage. This last question can get us into trouble if we assume too much about the original audience. They aren’t here to tell us their views, and we weren’t living in their time and setting to experience life the way they did, so we should always exercise caution here. However, there are times when we can be rather confident about how they viewed a particular subject, and this is one of those situations.

When we read our Bibles today, we often start at Genesis 1, because that is literally the beginning. Those of us seeking to defend our understanding of Genesis 1 often start in that chapter and move outward to the rest of Scripture to make our case, and that seems to make sense. But from the standpoint of biblical theology, Genesis 1 is not the beginning. Yes, it tells us about the beginning of all things, including the beginning of history, but it was not the beginning of God’s revelation to man in Scripture.

Assuming the traditional view that Moses wrote Genesis through Deuteronomy,2 it becomes clear that Genesis 1 was not the earliest revelation God gave to Moses or the Israelites. Within three months of God miraculously leading Israel out of Egypt, He brought them to the foot of Mt. Sinai (Exodus 19:1). While they were there, God delivered the Ten Commandments to the people of Israel, and in announcing the fourth commandment, God spoke these words:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. (Exodus 20:8–11, emphasis added)

The earliest information that the Israelites received from God on the subject of timing related to creation is found in Exodus 20 when God told the Israelites that they were going to work for six days and rest for one day because that is precisely what He did when He made everything. The people had already started living this out a few chapters earlier when God provided manna from heaven for them. On the sixth day, He gave them enough manna to last for two days and instructed them to gather enough for that day and the Sabbath that followed (Exodus 16:17–30). Sometime after God gave them the Ten Commandments, Moses wrote Genesis. Perhaps the Lord revealed the information to him during one of the times Moses met with Him on Mt. Sinai for forty days (Exodus 24:18, 34:28), or maybe the Holy Spirit inspired the writing of Genesis while Moses and the Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years.3 Whenever that occurred, the Israelites wouldn’t have heard the details of Genesis 1 until after they had heard the Lord announce the Ten Commandments.

If I am correct that the Israelites heard the giving of the Ten Commandments before they ever heard or read the words of Genesis 1, then there can be no doubt how they would’ve originally understood the days of the creation week. The Lord had already told them that He made everything in six days, and they knew these were 24-hour days because the Lord made a direct link between their seven-day workweek and the time it took Him to create everything. With the details about creation from the fourth commandment in their minds, they would have naturally made the connection between the fourth commandment and the days of the creation week.

When we compare this finding with our exegetical studies of Genesis 1 and our systematic work incorporating the rest of Scripture, we can rest assured that the days of the creation week were truly normal-length days.

Conclusion

Young-earth creationists have dutifully defended the historicity of Genesis 1–11 against an onslaught of arguments made by skeptics, evolutionists, and old-earth creationists. By approaching the debate from more of a systematic perspective, we have overlooked some additional arguments from biblical theology that could greatly benefit our apologetic efforts and enhance our understanding of Scripture.

The upcoming articles in this series will highlight passages in Genesis 1–11 that have not always been handled very well by apologists and theologians. But if we were to look at them through the lens of biblical theology, the meaning becomes clearer, and we can offer a more robust understanding of these foundational chapters of Scripture.

  1. Zuck, Roy B., A Biblical Theology of the Old Testament. Electronic ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1991), p. 2. ↩

  2. Since the 19th century, critical scholars have generally rejected Mosaic authorship, usually in favor of the documentary hypothesis. This is also known as the JEDP theory, which postulates that Genesis was compiled from multiple sources long after Moses, while the Israelites were exiled in Babylon or soon after their return. Though popular with critical scholars, the foundations for this hypothesis have been eroded. The discoveries of countless written texts predating Moses have obliterated the notion that writing was not invented by the time of Moses. For a good overview of the documentary hypothesis and its numerous shortcomings, see Gleason Archer, A Survey of Old Testament Introduction (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1994), 88–125. ↩

  3. Many creationists have adopted the tablet model hypothesis, which proposes that Genesis was written by up to ten different authors identified by the various colophons (or toledoth statements) found in Genesis. This view is attractive because it helps explain certain statements that seem to imply eyewitness reporting, such as the description of the rivers and lands in Genesis 2, and because it would demonstrate that man possessed the intelligence to read and write from the very start. However, the tablet model has never been proven and faces a variety of serious challenges. See Lee Anderson, Jr., “A Critical Evaluation of the Tablet Model: Considerations on the Origin of the Book of Genesis,” Creation Research Society Quarterly 2017, 54:5–26. ↩